Month: May 2012

I walked into the kitchen where my son was eating his breakfast the other morning and said “hi Tiger Tank” to him.  I call him random things like my “little Pumpkin Spice Latte”, “Pumpkin Pie”, Buddy, and of course “Tyler”.  When I called him Tiger Tank he asked me what a Tiger Tank is, and I didn’t know myself since I just made it up on the fly, so I said “oh you know tanks are what armies use to fight the bad guys” and tigers are strong animals, so I thought I would call you Tiger Tank.  He looked at me and considered my craziness and then said “hey dad, sometimes the bad guys are stronger and kill the good guys”.  For some reason I found that profound.  It could have been the time of day, the fact that I hadn’t had coffee yet, or both.

Do not stand at my grave and weep is a poem written in 1932 by Mary Elizabeth Frye. Although the origin of the poem was disputed until later in her life, Mary Frye’s authorship was confirmed in 1998 after research by Abigail Van Buren, a newspaper columnist.^[1]

“Do not stand at my grave and weep,

I am not there; I do not sleep.

I am a thousand winds that blow,

I am the diamond glints on snow,

I am the sun on ripened grain,

I am the gentle autumn rain.

When you awaken in the morning’s hush

I am the swift uplifting rush

Of quiet birds in circling flight.

I am the soft starlight at night.

Do not stand at my grave and cry,

I am not there; I did not die.”

– Wikipedia Article